2-999-761 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

Brothel, 1562. Animated scenes of carousing in village inns and brothels were enjoyed by 16th-century collectors of paintings in the Netherlands as amusing evidence of the instincts of peasants. The motifs, including a drunk balancing unsteadily on his head, suggest that the scene is to be read in a moralizing way: excess leads to foolishness